Giving up swaddle at 7 months - how soon will he adapt?

[MuddlingThru]

At 6 months ds was getting too big for his kiddopotamus swaddle so we put him in a grobag. His morning and lunchtime naps immediately shortened from 1.5hours to 20/30mins. Needless to say we were left with a very tired baby as the day progressed. It also threw out his food routine.
As a compromise we continued with the grobag but with his arms tucked inside it. His naps immediately improved to about 1-1.25hours. He generally sleeps through the night, the nights when he hasn't have been when an arm has managed to escape.
He is now 7 months and starting to roll during his playtime. I can therefore see a time in the not too distant future when he will roll at night/naps. I think I must therefore accept that I will need to set him free fairly soon. Those of you that have swaddled your little ones, have you any suggestions on how to smooth the transition or tales of encouragement that your little ones adapted quite quickly.

wow impressed that you managed to keep it up so long. i gave up swaddling when dd was about 3-4 months as she was rolling about and kept getting out lol. i know your experience is that his sleep shortens but with dd it didnt make any differance as she loves her bed. i have a few toys in her cot and if she wakes early she will play with them and prob falls asleep again so she gets her full nap.

hope it works out for you

oh my dd is 9 months now

I didn't swaddle but used a sling but maybe you could try the following: I found that when ds was little he would naturally wake up after about 45 mins, however once I discovered I could go in and resettle him for another 45 mins(by breastfeeding in my case, you could try rocking or cuddling as well perhaps?), he soon stopped waking up and just went the full 90 minutes without me having to go up.

Starshaker - I am very grateful that ds has been slow to roll. Only downside is that I have got very used to good naps and nights and am V reluctant to give that up.

Franny - I know what you mean about the 45min thing, ds started doing that at about 3 months. Like you I would pop up and re-settle him and eventually he got the hang of re-settling himself. It is my memory of spending half the day (it felt like) in his room settling him that makes me reluctant to go back to that. I guess the difference this time though is that he can settle himself off to sleep at the beginning of the nap which he couldn't do back then, so I would only have to spend a 1/4 of the day in his room re-settling him this time.

Hi MT. We cut the bottom off our Kiddopotamus swaddle bag when ds grew too big for it, because it made such a difference to his sleep!

We stopped at around 5 months, because he would not stay in the swadddle whatever we did. He wasn't rolling (he still can't do that at eight months!), just struggling out.

He was in the middle of a pretty bad sleep patch anyway, so I'm not sure how much difference it made, but he came through it and now just has a grobag and sleeps well.

When we stopped the swaddle we introduced a teddy which I put between us when feeding him last thing at night so it would smell of me/food. It seemed to help and be some sort of compensation for not being swaddled.

Good luck.

Lummox - when ds started breaking free of his kiddopotamus we bought a 2nd one and double swaddled, then tucked him under a well tucked in blanket!! - thank goodness this was once the weather was cooler so I didn't have to worry about overheating.
I have already introduced a blankie which he cuddles before I pop him in the grobag and I then tuck into the grobag. I think it is a useful signal to him that it is nap time therefore helping him to settle himself at the start of a nap. The issue is that as he comes into a light sleep he then plays with it as a toy - perhaps when I stop swaddling the novelty would wear off after a few days and he would ignore it in his light sleep phases.

I used to get really panicked about over-heating, but I couldn't cope with the lack of sleep.

Double-swaddling a fine plan if we have another baby!

I think the novelty does wear off. I've seen ds recently semi-wake up and stuff a bit of his teddy into his mouth before drifting off again. But at the beginning I think he was shocked that his arms were free and he was hitting things when he moved (a bit like an echo of the newborn Moro (sp?) reflex).

Any other ex-swaddlers out there with hints/tips/advice?

I stopped swaddling at about 6 months because ds kept rolling over and getting stuck. I first swaddled with one arm free then plucked up the courage to put him in a grobag - I used the swaddling blanket as a comforter. I think he found it wierd at first and had some bad nights but they soon get used to the strange feeling of their arms being free! DS is now waking in the night because of teeth - there is allways something! Good luck!

I have started to put ds down for his 3rd nap of the day with his arms out. This nap is usually only 30 mins long so even if he cuts it short it is not the end of the world. Hopefully this will help him get over the novelty before he starts rolling and I have to set him free full time.

I swaddled DD in cellular blanket with arms wrapped for first 4 months then with one arm out and finally both arms. Still wrap her in cellular blanket - arms out and 2 other cellular blankets over the top but tucked under cot mattress. She seems to like this security. DD now 13 mnths - not crawling or walking! Tried gro bag but had similar experience to others in that DD disturbed in naps and night time sleep more.

use it as a body swaddle then as a snuggly.